For nearly 50 years, Flora Templeton Stuart — trusted personal injury lawyer in Kentucky — has fought for Kentucky families against opponents who thought they were too powerful to be held accountable. Now, a new threat is harming children across the state, and the legal system is catching up. Our youth is facing new challenges with the internet – social media is often addictive and destructive. Flora Templeton Stuart is here for families and children who are harmed by social media addiction.
What is Social Media Addiction?
Most parents expect their children to spend time on their phones — but there is a real difference between normal use and a harmful addiction. The warning sign is not just how much time is spent online — it is whether the behavior keeps happening even when it is clearly causing harm. For children and teenagers, the danger is even greater. An estimated 27% of children who spend three or more hours a day on social media show signs of poor mental health — and young people are especially vulnerable because their brains are still developing. Recovered + 2
Common warning signs of social media addiction include:
- Compulsive checking — an inability to cut back on use despite wanting to LAOP Center
- Mood changes — irritability, anxiety, or distress when unable to access social media LAOP Center
- Withdrawal from real life — pulling away from offline activities, hobbies, and in-person relationships LAOP Center
- Declining sleep quality — staying up late scrolling, difficulty disconnecting at night LAOP Center
- Depression and low self-esteem — driven by social comparison, cyberbullying, and pressure to maintain an idealized online image Diamond Rehab Thailand
- Continuing despite harm — persisting with heavy use even after it has clearly damaged mental health, relationships, or schoolwork Recovered
If you recognize these signs in your child, what you are seeing is not a bad habit — it may be the result of a product deliberately designed to cause it.
Building Your Emotional Distress Claim in Kentucky
Emotional distress claims require far more than your word alone. To build the strongest possible case, you should gather and preserve the following:
Medical and psychological records: Detailed clinical documentation from a therapist, psychiatrist, or counselor clearly establishing the nature, severity and duration of your suffering. Without a formal diagnosis, insurance carriers and juries are far less likely to treat your claim seriously.
Screenshots, logs, and timestamps: Every harassing post, message, or comment. Do not delete anything, and preserve device data before accounts are closed or content disappears.
Statements from family, friends, and employers: Third-party accounts of how the harassment visibly affected your behavior, relationships, and job performance. These personal perspectives can convey the depth of your suffering in ways clinical records alone cannot.
Platform reports and ticket numbers: Evidence that you reported the abuse through the platform’s own tools. If the platform failed to act, this documentation helps support a negligence argument against it.
Police or school reports: Any official reports filed with law enforcement, or with your child’s school under Kentucky’s anti-bullying statute, KRS 158.4481.
Cyberbullying and Online Harassment: What Kentucky Law Covers
Kentucky makes it a crime to harass another person using electronic communications with no legitimate purpose and with intent to annoy, harm, harass, or intimidate a victim. Under KRS 525.080, a harassing communications charge is a Class B misdemeanor, carrying a $250 fine and/or up to 90 days in jail. When conduct escalates, Kentucky’s stalking statutes under KRS 508.130–508.150 apply to any intentional course of conduct — including through computers or the internet — that would cause a reasonable person to suffer substantial mental distress.
Beyond criminal exposure, victims can pursue civil claims. A pattern of targeted harassment — repeated humiliation, false accusations, coordinated attacks — can satisfy the elements of IIED when the conduct is extreme and the distress is documented. Kentucky’s criminal statutes also help establish in a civil case that the conduct was wrongful.
Call Flora Templeton Stuart
Flora Templeton Stuart has spent nearly 50 years fighting for Kentucky families against powerful corporations that put profits over people. If your family has been harmed by social media addiction, you deserve an advocate who takes your case personally.
If your child has been harmed by social media addiction, call Flora Templeton Stuart Accident Injury Lawyers in Kentucky at (888) 782-9090 for a free consultation.
